Foreign

Zimbabwe suspends accreditation of BBC journalists
HARARE -- Zimbabwe has suspended accreditation of BBC journalists seeking to cover events in the country, accusing them of unethical and unprofessional conduct, but the move is seen as one way to gag the press in the run-up to presidential electio...

Chippy's only a call away
LONDON -- The caller who woke safari park workers in the middle of the night didn't say a word, but his shriek gave him away. One keeper recognised the sound of a chimpanzee, and the search led to the chimp enclosure at Blair Drummond Safari Park...

RAY OF SON-SHINE:
Celine Dion and her husband Rene Angelil pose with their six-month-old son Rene-Charles after his christening at the Notre Dame basilica in Old Montreal on Wednesday. (AP) Eastern Cape   South Africa ...

Itchy head, itchy finger
ANKARA -- A Turkish policeman was fighting for his life in hospital on Wednesday after shooting himself while scratching his head with a gun, Sabah newspaper reported. The officer was walking out from his office when he tried to scratch his head ...

JUST KIDS HAVING FUN:
Four lion cubs play with two tiger cubs at the Wildlife World of Ji'nan in China's Shandong province. The cubs were born in March and have become the stars of the centre. (AP) Eastern Cape   South Africa&...

Star-crossed lovers cross paths with crossed signals
LONDON-- The course of true love never did run smooth, especially for a love-struck man who flew to the other side of the world to see his girlfriend, only to find she had done the same, the British press reported yesterday. Ian Johnstone, who wa...

Traffickers get death
BANGKOK -- Thailand's Criminal Court has set a grim record by sentencing 19 drug traffickers to death in cases involving more than two million amphetamine pills and nine kilograms of heroin. The decisions handed down on Wednesday in five separate...

Tobacco firm sorry
NEW YORK-- Tobacco giant Phillip Morris has apologised for a company-funded study that stated the early deaths of smokers is one of the "positive effects" of cigarette consumption. "We understand that this was not only a terrible mistake, but th...

'25000 killed in Peru'
LIMA -- Some 25000 people died and nearly 10000 disappeared in political violence in Peru during the 1980s and 1990s, according to a government census. The Ministry of Women's Census for Peace, released on Wednesday, was carried out in 2192 rural...

New Nepal PM sworn in
KATHMANDU -- Nepal's King Gyanendra yesterday administered the oath of office to newly appointed Prime Minister Sher Bahadur Deuba at the royal palace, officials said. Shortly afterwards, Deuba administered the oath of office to the rest of his n...

Police kill 7 'in cold blood'
NAIROBI -- Police shot dead seven men as they lay face down beside a road here, witnesses said in news reports published yesterday. Police said the men were killed in a shoot-out after they were taken from a bus on Wednesday. But witnesses told ...

156 Moz officers fired
MAPUTO -- Mozambique's national police force has expelled 156 officers so far this year for misconduct while on duty, including lending weapons to criminal gangs, the police command said yesterday. Sixty officers were expelled from the force in M...

'Malaria costs $12bn'
HARARE -- Malaria costs Africa $12billion yearly and slows economic growth by 1,3 percent annually, South African Health Minister Manto Tshabalala-Msimang said yesterday at a meeting in Zimbabwe. The minister was launching a regional scheme to co...

SA envoy reappointed to Lesotho
MASERU -- King Letsie III yesterday received the South African high commissioner to Lesotho, Japhet Ndlovu, at the Royal Palace here where Ndlovu presented his credentials. Ndlovu served as high commissioner in Maseru from 1997 to the end of las...

Rebel withdrawal under way
SKOPJE -- A retreat by ethnic Albanian guerillas from the areas they have controlled for the past three weeks in northwestern Macedonia was "under way" and no incidents had been reported, various observers said yesterday. The withdrawal was confi...

Vote to lift ban on US travel to Cuba
WASHINGTON -- The House of Representatives has voted to lift restrictions on travel to Cuba by US citizens which sponsors said would be a first step toward ending the communist nation's economic isolation and hastening democratic reforms. "What w...